But isn’t that the problem though? Shouldn’t police only use deadly force in the face of an imminent objectively reasonable deadly threat?
Someone running away from you with a taser doesn’t constitute that threat.
The reason the cop shot was pure ego. Him and his buddy just had their ass handed to them, and now the guy was getting away.
Someone running away from you with a loaded incapacitating weapon, in a state of altered consciousness, unresponsive to any commands, and uncooperative with any protocols that govern interaction with authority after you just got done fighting with them, so under the influence of an adrenaline spike.
Look, I'm no fan of the calculus of interaction with the justice system getting tilted heavily in the direction of 'your life is about to be permanently ruined anyway", but goddamnit, I'm not faulting someone in those circumstances, especially when everyone involved still managed to follow protocol.
I don't believe in "tough on crime" deterrence by punishment policing as a panacea. Hell, I think incarceration is done in excess, and some of the things we tack the felony label on which just so happens to disenfranchise someone from voting for life seems a bit damn fishy. I don't even blame the guy in making a run for it given the current climate, or otherwise. Willingly giving up your agency is unnatural as all hell when you're in your right mind. In an altered state? That doesn't mean you get some sort of get out of the consequences free card, or that you can get into a violent scuffle with an armed officer, run off with his equipment, and not run the risk of things getting escalated further, especially when there are other people around. If anything, that in and of itself should be motivation enough not to let yourself get that far gone.
It isn't like I don't feel for the family, or about the circumstances. It isn't like I threw a hat in the air to celebrate the story. Quite the opposite. I wanted to see what happened to judge for myself, and well, I can't with 100% certainty say that in imagining myself as an officer with training, and regular experience with violent interactions on the streets, and having a target painted on my back due to the current political atmosphere adding to already considerable job stress that I might not have done the same thing in the heat of the moment, especially if I thought other people may be harmed given that a suspect just ran off with a piece of my equipment, and my frontal lobe hadn't yet registered my handgun was in my hands, if I didn't get things under control now.
In my case, a hypothetical one mind, it wouldn't even come from a place of ego so much as concern in terms of an imperative to minimize potential harm to bystanders.
So... I guess what I'm saying is I can entertain the reasonability of his actions. You might not. I don't expect everyone to see things like I do. Given the footage I saw curated by the media, I can accept that things escalated, but an attempt at following protocol was made, which is enough to get the officers off the hook in my book. I may not like that it did, but I've been around enough scuffles and frenzied encounters where lives are on the line to know that when stuff goes down, 90% of the rational creature takes a hike until the substance of the confrontation is resolved.
And not a damn word of this response would change given the suspect's color.
We all want to get out alive. We shouldn't have to feel like today is going to be the day. We shouldn't be locked in a fundamental struggle to just get by and be left alone. Yet... Here we are. Wish it was different. Wish it was a hell of a lot different. Wish that what ever drove him to get that incapacitated to escape from it hadn't been so bad. I wish that getting perp walked weren't something so adept at ruining your life. I wish we were all a bit more forgiving of each other in our moment's of weakness; but you can wish in one hand, and shit in the other, and see which one fills up first.
The cop did what he was trained to do. His partner did what he was trained to do, the courts will do what they're going to do. Whether I wish it different or not. You can condemn him. I won't. I can't. I didn't see a fundamental breach of protocol.
EDIT: and to be clear, I tried putting myself in the victim's shoes, as difficult as that is, and I'd probably be dead too in that case if dropped in at the moment his fight or flight instinct kicked in. So make no mistake, it isn't coming from a place of "it can't happen to me." Out of my sane mind, I'm fairly certain I'd elevate my freedom above all else.
If what I've said here makes me a horrible person... I guess I'm a horrible person.
But again, this isn't a deadly threat because they're running away. If they turned around and aimed it at you, then sure, you could claim that they are a threat to you–though still not a deadly one. If you shoot someone running away from you, you're not doing it because you're threatened, you're doing it because you don't want them to get away, and that's the point that was being made.